9 Virginia Road Names That Change So Often Even Locals Give Up

Could you drive across a Virginia county and name every road sign you passed along the way?

Many Virginians can’t.

The route number stays fixed on the map, but the name painted on the sign overhead keeps changing anyway, block after block.

These are the Virginia roads that switch names so often, even the people who drive them every day give up keeping track.

1. Route 7

Route 7 turns into King Street the moment it crosses into Alexandria, running past rowhouses and restaurants instead of the open shoulders it wears everywhere else.

Head into Fairfax County and Route 7 keeps its pavement but trades its street sign for a new name, Leesburg Pike.

That name carries Route 7 through much of Loudoun County too, though it hasn’t always.

Until December 2021, Loudoun’s stretch of Route 7 was called Harry Byrd Highway, after a former governor and longtime U.S. senator.

Loudoun County’s Board of Supervisors voted to drop that name and match the Leesburg Pike name Fairfax County already used next door.

One number, three names.

2. Route 50

Route 50 runs as Arlington Boulevard through Arlington County, six lanes of shopping centers and apartment towers packed against the road.

Cross into Fairfax County and Route 50 takes on a name that barely counts as a name.

Fairfax County retired the old Lee-Jackson Memorial Highway name in 2022 and replaced it with the plain route number, Route 50, rather than pick something new.

The county budgeted $1.4 million just to update the signs on this highway and its Route 29 counterpart.

Loudoun County made a different move on its own stretch, trading the name John Mosby Highway for Little River Turnpike the same month Route 7 changed next door.

Keep driving into Fauquier County and Route 50 reverts to John S. Mosby Highway, a name Loudoun already left behind at the county line.

Same road. Four different signs.

3. Route 29

Route 29 becomes Langston Boulevard the moment it enters Arlington County, a name the County Board adopted in 2021 to honor John Mercer Langston, the first Black person elected to Congress from Virginia.

Drive into Fairfax County and Route 29 does something almost none of Virginia’s other renamed highways manage.

It just goes by “Route 29.”

Fairfax County retired the old Lee Highway name in 2023 and skipped picking a replacement entirely.

Keep going south into Albemarle County and Route 29 shifts again, this time to Seminole Trail, a designation on the books since 1928.

Three names, one shield.

4. Route 1

Route 1 changes its legal name more than a dozen times without ever leaving Virginia.

Richmond Highway carries Route 1 through Alexandria, Fairfax County, and Arlington County, a name Alexandria adopted in 2019 after retiring Jefferson Davis Highway.

The Virginia General Assembly later set a statewide default for whatever was left of the old name: Emancipation Highway, effective for any locality that hadn’t picked something else by the end of 2021.

Chesterfield County picked something else, and its 13-mile stretch became plain “Route 1” instead, the same trick Fairfax pulled on Route 29 and Route 50.

Farther north, Route 1 turns into Washington Street and then Wythe Street through Petersburg, and Belvidere Street and Chamberlayne Avenue through Richmond.

From there, Route 1 becomes Brook Road through Henrico County and Washington Highway once it crosses into Hanover County.

One number, constant new names.

5. Route 123

Route 123 starts out as Ox Road south of Fairfax City, a name older than the state highway system itself.

Cross into the Town of Vienna and Route 123 takes the name Chain Bridge Road, then changes again inside Vienna’s own downtown to Maple Avenue.

Leave Vienna behind and Route 123 goes back to Chain Bridge Road, all the way to Tysons.

From Tysons to the George Washington Memorial Parkway, Route 123 becomes Dolley Madison Boulevard, named for the former first lady.

Then it switches back to Chain Bridge Road one final time on the way to the river.

Chain Bridge Road shows up, disappears, and comes back twice in the same drive.

Locals gave up years ago.

6. Route 236

Route 236 becomes Duke Street as soon as it enters Alexandria, six lanes of car dealerships and strip malls near the Capital Beltway.

Head west into unincorporated Fairfax County and Route 236 takes the name Little River Turnpike, tracing back to a toll road chartered in 1802.

Keep driving and Route 236 reaches the City of Fairfax, where the name changes one more time to Main Street.

Here's the part that trips people up: Route 50, a completely different highway a few miles north, carries the exact same name, Little River Turnpike, through part of Loudoun County.

Two highways, one shared name, and Route 236 never even crosses paths with Route 50.

Same name. Different road entirely.

7. Route 250

Route 250 rolls down the Blue Ridge as Rockfish Gap Turnpike, a name recalling the mountain pass it crosses west of Charlottesville.

Closer to town, Route 250 becomes Ivy Road, then crosses to the other side of Charlottesville as Richmond Road.

Keep heading east and Route 250 passes through Goochland County as Broad Street Road, then arrives in Richmond simply as Broad Street, the city's main downtown corridor.

One route number covers all of it, from a mountain pass west of Charlottesville to the steps of the state capital.

Keeping all five straight is the challenge.

8. Route 28

Route 28 runs south from Loudoun County as Sully Road, a six-lane freeway that also carries a second, official name honoring longtime local resident and Redskins legend Darrell Green.

The Commonwealth designated that stretch Darrell Green Boulevard through state legislation, and both names apply at once.

Sully Road becomes Centreville Road on the approach to the Prince William County line, then Route 28 splits into a one-way pair, Church Street and Center Street, through downtown Manassas.

South of Manassas, Route 28 becomes Nokesville Road and keeps that name for the rest of its run through Prince William County.

Four names, one shield.

9. Route 3

Route 3 runs through downtown Fredericksburg as William Street, lined with brick storefronts near the city's historic district.

Head west and Route 3 changes to Plank Road the moment it leaves the city and crosses into Spotsylvania County, tracing ground fought over during the Battle of Chancellorsville.

That name comes from a 19th-century toll road surfaced with wooden planks, and the modern highway still largely follows its path.

Keep going west and Route 3 becomes Germanna Highway once it crosses into Orange County, a name that carries the road on into Culpeper County as well.

Head east from Fredericksburg instead and Route 3 becomes King's Highway through Westmoreland County, closer to the Northern Neck than to any interstate.

Fredericksburg to the Northern Neck, and the name never sits still.

Why Virginia Numbers Roads at All

Virginia didn't always number its highways.

Through the early 1920s, close to 250 different named "trails" crisscrossed the country, each backed by its own promotional association and marked with its own painted symbol nailed to utility poles and fence posts.

Virginia joined the rest of the country and replaced the whole tangle with a single numbered system to end the confusion, following a national standard adopted around the same time in every state.